Iraq/Kurdistan: Kurdistan to Begin Exporting Oil Through SOMO After Loan from Baghdad: KRG Officials

Nov 17, 2014 | Dalshad Abdullah, Asharq Al-Awsat
View Original

Erbil— The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) will begin exporting oil through under Baghdad’s supervision once it receives a loan it says was promised from the Iraqi government, as part of an agreement reached between the two sides on Thursday, senior Kurdish officials told Asharq Al-Awsat.

Deputy head of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee of the KRG, Dalshad Shaaban, said on Sunday that the KRG would now begin exporting “150,000 barrels per day of oil through SOMO”—Iraq’s state-owned oil company—once it received a 500 million US dollar loan from Baghdad.

The loan, Shaaban maintains, came as part of last Thursday’s agreement to end a months-long dispute between Iraq and Erbil over the latter’s independent export of oil.